"THE UNTEACHABILITY OF MANKIND"
In a 1935 House of Commons debate regarding British air power relative to Germany , Winston Churchill expressed his dismay with the British government ' s failure to act upon the growing threat of German air power , a threat the government had concealed from the British people . Government inaction ( and even dishonesty ) in the face of the growing peril , Churchill said , fell into ' that long dismal catalogue of the fruitlessness of experience, and the confirmed unteachability of mankind .' Institutional inertia often keeps governments behind the times . Democratically elected governments naturally dislike spending more money than they can afford ; priorities are always debatable . British leaders before the Second World War were very concerned about employment , economics , spending and b udgets . One distinguishing characteristic of the American prison cris...